


it could be a lie

by Crykea



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, Hurt Klaus Hargreeves, Non-Consensual Possession, Possession, Protective Siblings, Self-Harm, Sibling Bonding, Sober Klaus Hargreeves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-13 23:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28661949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crykea/pseuds/Crykea
Summary: The Hargreeves are thrown into an unexpected altercation after Klaus starts acting strange at breakfast.
Relationships: Klaus Hargreeves & Everyone, Klaus Hargreeves & God, The Hargreeves Family
Comments: 5
Kudos: 174





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> should i write a part two of this,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, like a chapter two I mean
> 
> anyways I've never posted anything I've written for tua so here's this!!!!!!!!! i hope yall like itttttt

The family breakfast is rudely interrupted by Klaus having some sort of freakout across the table and only got more worrying afterwards.

They'd been trying, more often, to make an effort at being an actual family. This meant that every morning, everyone who was able would be present at breakfast to eat together. The rules from their childhood were no longer present. Breakfast took place at 10 in the morning instead of 6, the siblings encouraged each other to talk while they ate instead of sitting in silence, and there was no longer any assigned seating. Grace was smiling brightly when she passed out the pancakes and eggs. She’d taken to sitting in Reginald’s old seat at the head of the table whenever they ate together, much to the pleasure of the siblings. It almost felt like a normal family breakfast most of the time, though who could account for normal with the Hargreeves.

On this particular morning, Grace was spending some extra time recharging in front of her paintings. Instead, Klaus was sitting at the end of the table in her place, the 'empty' seat beside him presumably occupied by Ben. As a family, alongside their necessary training routines, they’d been making an effort to do more listening. Family meetings felt more like group therapy than accusatory gatherings nowadays, and they were very slowly starting to learn about each other again. One of their longest discussions took place after 'special training' was mentioned offhandedly by Luther of all people. That day found the siblings spending the entire day camped out in the main living room under blankets with special mugs of hot chocolate from Grace. All this to say, the siblings didn’t glare or react as they normally would have before the Not-Pocalypse, when Klaus suddenly began telling off the empty air to his right.

"Hey, no offence, but can you actually get the fuck out of my sight? I'm sure you were prettier in life, but I'm actually good without the whole blood-for-syrup deal you're giving me here." Vanya raised an eyebrow at him from where she was sitting furthest away across the table. Diego snickered slightly, but it sounded vaguely forced at the idea of blood on his breakfast. "I have literally only met you once and I'd prefer it if we kept it that way."

At that, even Five turned to look at Klaus. A ghost he’d met before? Or was it a ghost of a person he knew? Sure, they had learned that ghosts tended to follow their killers around, but based on what Klaus had said previously, he actually didn’t personally know any of the current ghostly occupants of the mansion, save for Ben, of course. Most of them were Five's, meaning they'd been murdered far before any of them had even been born. This was interesting. The siblings watched as their sibling attempted to shoo the ghost away with his fork, brandishing it like an actual weapon. It was honestly kind of funny watching Klaus prepare for battle against the invisible person, with his fork held sloppily in a mockery of the way they were raised to hold weapons.

However, the humour of the situation quickly morphed into tension as Klaus very suddenly shot out of his chair, his whole body twitching like he'd been run through with electricity. As quickly as the episode came upon him, it passed, but not before showing the briefest flicker of blue silhouettes, one sitting in Ben's chair beside Klaus, and one lunging for their sibling. Ben looked shocked, with his arms outstretched as though he were trying to help. The figures disappeared quickly, though, leaving Klaus alone standing alone at his end of the table. They watched, shocked, as Klaus rolled his shoulders and neck, not seeming to be bothered by the loud crack that came with the movement. Allison winced at the sound.

"Klaus, are you… okay? Was that ghost bothering you?" Vanya started from the other end of the table. Her voice was cautious, as though trying not to overstep. Klaus cracked his neck once more before turning to stare directly at her with a wide, slightly offputting, smile.

"Oh, yeah! I'm alright, Vanny. Don’t you worry your… pretty little head." Klaus winked at her, but it looked more like a twitch than a purposeful wink, as if Klaus had forgotten how to properly manipulate his facial features. His hand moved across the table as he held eye contact, only breaking when he wasn't able to find whatever he was looking for. His brow furrowed. "Hm. I'll be right back."

"And where are you off to?" Five said, suspicious at his sibling’s strange behaviour. 

"Kitchen."

"Why?"

"Seems I forgot to get myself a knife," the offputting smile took up residence on his face once more, "y'know, to cut the pancakes?"

"You usually just use a fork." Five's eyes narrowed.

"Consider this me switching it up for the day then" Klaus replied, eyes and voice rigidly cold. He stood and walked off to one of the doorways nearby, walking with purpose and intensity instead of loping like he usually did.

“Wrong… Klaus, you’re going to the wrong door.” Allison said, placing her own utensils down on either side of her plate and moving to stand up from the table.

“Oh, silly me! Just all the drugs making my brain addled!” Klaus sang in a mockery of his usual tone.

“Aren’t you sober, though?” Luther asked, genuine confusion painting his features. The teacup filled with coffee that Klaus had laid out in Ben’s spot at the table moved suddenly and smashed off the table. The siblings whipped their heads around to stare at the empty seat. In Klaus’ training, he’d made great headway at making Ben tangible most of the time. Making ghosts visible was easier apparently, but making them able to touch things? That was something that required teamwork. Ben had told them it was like Klaus needed to activate his powers a certain way and keep them active so that Ben could leech some energy away to move objects. Luther still didn’t really get it.

In their distraction, Klaus slipped away into the door Allison had pointed out, leaving the door swinging silently behind him. When he re-emerged a moment later, the knife he was holding was a lot bigger than one a person would use to cut pancakes. Klaus pressed a fingertip to the point of the blade, his smile soft before he looked back up at his siblings. What they saw made Five immediately stand from his chair with a jump followed closely by everyone else. Instead of their brother’s usual green eyes, his eyes had taken on a cold brown. A far too familiar shade to both numbers Five and Seven.

“That’s not Klaus.” Five said at the same time as Vanya gasped out “Leonard…!?” causing the person holding the knife to laugh, genuinely sounding amused.

“Aw, little Number Five is just as protective as he was before he disappeared, huh? ” Not-Klaus wiped a fake tear from his cheek before turning his cold eyes on the group, “No, I’ve got this brother hostage, though. Unless you’re willing to go through him to get to me? Funny, I wonder if you all would actually be able to hurt me if I wasn’t possessing this body? Well. This has been fun, but I’m going to enact my revenge now, starting with this useless medium, I suppose. I know there are others you care about more than this useless brother of yours, but it seems I’ll have to settle for him. Can’t really go around harming any of the rest of you without borrowing this, but I’m sure watching your brother die will do the trick.”

Before even Five could blink across the room to stop him, Not-Klaus swiped the blade of the kitchen knife deep across Klaus’ arm, slicing cleanly through the umbrella tattoo that they all had inked into their forearms.

“Ooh! Interesting, so I  _ can _ feel that.” He looked up at the horrified group through his eyelashes, “So can he, by the way, he’s just tucked away for now so I can deal with...  _ this _ .”

The room, after their immediate shock, jumped into action. Five blinked across the room, apparating behind his brother. Leonard swirled Klaus’ body around to face the small man, a grin stuck on his face as if the events were actually amusing. Looking Five directly in the eyes with those unnatural brown eyes that didn’t quite fit in with Klaus’ familiar face, Leonard jerked the knife again halfway across Klaus’ arm just under the first cut. For a brief second, the amused grin melted into pain, but Leonard rolled Klaus’ shoulders and took back control of the face. Five’s hand whipped out, grasping Klaus’ wrist, stilling the slice of the knife in its motion. Leonard morphed Klaus’ face into a playful pout.

“Aww, what are you going to do, Number Five? Are you willing to hurt your brother to get to me?”

“First of all,  _ sibling _ . Not brother.” Five ground out, fingers tightening in their bruising grip on his sibling’s wrist. “Second of all…” He glanced back behind Leonard, flicking his eyes at Diego who, noticing the signal, threw a knife at the handle of the one in their sibling’s hand. Leonard growled as the kitchen knife clattered to the ground at his feet. Blood was flowing steadily from the two deep wounds on Klaus’ arm, dripping down and staining his clothes and the floor beneath his feet. Vanya ran forward, eyes flashing bright silver for the split second it took her to shove the two sharp objects across the room and out of reach. She yanked on Luther’s arm as she darted forward, making him stumble into action, taking over for Five in restraining their sibling.

“You’re all idiots.” Leonard glared coldly forward, kicking one heeled boot out at Five’s shin. The crack as his boot connected with his brother’s shin made Five wince and jump back. Klaus’s body thrashed in Luther’s grip, making the blood flow faster. “I can stay in here for as long as I want! It’s not like this moron is strong enough to kick me out!” Despite the fact that he was using Klaus’ vocal cords, the laugh that came out of his mouth was so alien that their sibling was unrecognizable in the fact.

“You’ve already lost a lot of blood,” Allison said from behind them. “Are you sure you’ll be able to hold on if he’s unconscious?”

“You’re asking  _ me? _ Do you not know anything about your brother’s powers, or?”

_ “Sibling.”  _ Five growled.

“Do  _ you? _ ” Allison countered, her hands on her hips and her expression schooled into something carefully neutral to hide how nervous she was. Klaus was already starting to look paler than usual, but his eyes, or rather Leonard’s eyes, remained bright, sharp, and feverish as they stayed locked on Allison. 

“Why don’t we find out?” He lashed out, unexpectedly digging Klaus’s dark purple painted nails into the bleeding wound on his other arm. For a split second, the control Leonard had seemed to melt away slightly as Klaus yelped in pain and flinched his hand away, his eyes melting from the cold brown back to green. Almost as suddenly as the change overcame their sibling though, Leonard’s brown flooded back into the eyes and the nails dug further in, making the wound leak still more blood somehow. Vanya was panicking. Her hair was floating slightly off her shoulders, making it impossible to miss. Leonard’s eyes locked onto her’s, his expression going stony for the first time since the possession took place. “This is your fault, you know.  _ You _ are the reason I’m doing this.  _ You _ are the reason I’m dead.”

Five’s eyes widened as Vanya’s eyes flashed bright silver. In a split second decision, he leapt over to her, gripped the meat of her shoulder, and the pair were gone in a flash. Leonard chuckled, the laugh coming out slightly strained, supposedly from the blood loss.

“Uh oh!” He raised his eyebrows at the remaining siblings, blood still pouring from his arm though both were now restrained by Diego. “Looks like the assassin and the bomb are no longer here. Whatever shall we do.”

“Wait, oh my god, w-we-we’re idiots. Allison, rumour him.” Diego said, sounding extremely frustrated, but his voice was wavering almost imperceptibly. Allison smacked the palm of her hand against her forehead, frustrated at herself, but before she could say anything, one of the coffee mugs from the breakfast table launched itself out of nowhere, smacking against Klaus’s temple. The siblings all watched as the heavy ceramic hit their sibling immediately followed by his eyes turning green and rolling back into his head, body going limp. They stood frozen for a second, eyes flicking back and forth between their unconscious sibling and the breakfast table. Their daze only broke when Vanya and Five suddenly flashed back into the room ready for a fight only to find the ‘intruder’ unconscious in Luther’s arms, the floor beneath them covered in coffee and blood.

“Oh my god.” Vanya breathed, before turning away from them all and shouting, “Mom!”


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _After getting jumped by the ghost of Harold’s past, Klaus floated._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW this took a while to get myself to write!!!! hope you enjoy this conclusion!

After getting jumped by the ghost of Harold’s past, Klaus floated. 

Possession wasn’t something he’d ever looked much into and he’d concluded that it was something too dangerous to practice around other ghosts. Sure, he practiced with Ben, but that rarely happened. It wasn’t as if there were many times in his life where he was truly alone enough to practice something like that away from ghosts. All this to say, possession still felt new and weird, but not as disorienting as the first time it had ever happened.

His own voice rang loud in his ears. He had a front row seat to every experience his body was having. Even though it wasn’t Klaus, it still felt like he was making those facial expressions himself or moving his mouth alongside those words even tho he physically wasn’t. His consciousness floated in a sort of liminal space within himself, tucked away and small in the corner of his own mind. The voices of his siblings were slightly warped as though he was hearing them in a dream or his head was underneath water. If not for the fact that he was  _ possessed _ it honestly might’ve been funny how warbling they all sounded. Instead, it was terrifying and nightmarish.

He felt his own face wink at Vanya. Gross. In retaliation he shoved his consciousness against the ghost’s, hoping to catch him unaware enough to gain back control. It was no use. His hand groped around behind him for a knife that wasn’t there making his consciousness laugh behind Harold’s. There wasn’t so much ‘laughter’ in the form he was currently forced into but it was like his mind shimmered slightly against Harold’s sharp prescence when he noticed that what he was looking for wasn’t actually sitting on the table. ‘ _ Who the fuck doesnt cut up their food before eating it _ ’ Harold thought back at him, his voice pointed and harsh. Klaus stuck his metaphysical tongue out at the presence above him.

The visuals of the table through his eyes were weird, just as they were when Ben possessed him. He vaguely recalled some article about different coloured eyes seeing colours differently, and boy if that wasn’t true. The sun from the window behind him was no longer as painfully bright as it was before when he was seeing with his own eyes, and things looked less faded in colour because of it. Weird did that mean his eyes actually changed colour with who was possessing him? That was good to note at least. ‘ _ Can you shut the fuck up? _ ’ Harold’s thoughts interrupted him unbidden. Klaus laugh-shimmered back at him again.

Through Harold’s eyes, he watched his body get piloted off in the direction of the kitchen door only to turn slightly and head instead to the parlour door beside it. He laughed harder at him, only vaguely hearing the broken speech of Allison correcting him on where he was going. Klaus’s voice came out in a sing-song way that made Klaus shiver. God, being possessed was weird. He shoved harder against Harold’s consciousness, making his feet trip slightly as Harold hastily shoved back in. Really, how had his siblings not put two and two together yet.

Just as they started to be getting suspicious, a teacup was launched off the table and shattered on the floor. Klaus whooped from where he was trapped in his own body. He couldn’t see the ghosts, another weird vision change, because good ole powerless Harold was possessing him, but that was the last place that he’d seen Ben so it must’ve been him. Unless Vanya was just deciding to flex her powers at the absolute weirdest time. The wood of the kitchen door was smooth against his hands as his body pushed open the kitchen door.

“Come on, come on, come on…” Klaus’s voice was a little bit frenetic as Harold dropped the act now that he was alone. “This house is so  _ big _ where the fuck do you keep anything. Shouldn’t knives be easily accessible for cooking? I-- Ah!” Klaus’s hand curled around the handle of a knife that was decidedly  _ much _ bigger than the butter knives normal people would use to cut pancakes. He really wished he could speak in this weird form, trapped by Harold, but the most he could do was throw himself around inside the walls of his own body and warp angrily at the man in possession of him. “Hey now, none of that. It’ll be over soon.” Harold was sickening, truly.

At least his siblings must have caught on to something as he emerged from the kitchen holding a chef’s knife instead of one of buttering toast. The strange sort of sensory-deprivation-but-not was not at all pleasant especially not when he felt his face smile and then without warning had the tip of the sharp blade pressing into the tip of his finger. His mind winced. Of course, Grace would never keep a blade even slightly dull in her kitchen. Five and Vanya jumped up from their seats, staring him directly in the eyes as Klaus desperately tried to pry the control of his hands, at least, from Harold. The warping of his sibling’s speech made it so that he couldn’t quite catch what Five and Vanya said as they spoke over each other all of a sudden. It must’ve been good though, because the laugh that was pried out of Klaus’ throat was entirely Harold, leaving no doubt as to what was going on.

Klaus sat back despairing as Harold taunted Five, but as soon as they started walking toward him, there was a sudden aching pain across his arm. He’d been so distracted watching his siblings that he’d forgotten there was a knife in his captor’s hand. He felt his circulatory system throb, pumping blood toward the deep wound on his forearm and cursed-- although in his current form it was more of an angry shudder than actual words.

Harold cooed at the way the pain looped back and forth between the two of them, amplifying the sharp ache. “So I  _ can  _ feel that.” He looked up at the horrified group through his eyelashes, “So can he, by the way, he’s just tucked away for now so I can deal with...  _ this  _ .” As Five blinked across the room to attempt to restrain Harold, Klaus felt his face morph back into a grin-- one that was wholly not his own this time-- before there was a deeper aching stab of pain just underneath where the first one was. Klaus’s spectral hands felt wet with blood as it poured down his arm, dripping from his fingertips onto the marble floor. Klaus shoved in retaliation against Harold as they both winced in pain and gained control of his body for a split second, feeling the grin melt off his face, before Harold pushed him back again.

The pain made it hard to focus, but he heard more taunting from Harold and all of a sudden the knife in his hand was clattering to the ground as Harold growled. And, wow, that sounded weird coming from him. Come on, come  _ on. _ His siblings were really trying to  _ reason _ with Harold right now? As much as he hated feeling trapped, he could really do with some restraints right about now so that he would stop  _ hurting himself _ . Harold, taking advantage of their attempts to calm him down, thrashed and dug Klaus’ newly painted nails deep into the wound on his forearm. The blinding pain forced Harold out of his body for another tiny moment as Klaus yelped and wrenched his hand away from his arm.

As soon as Harold jumped back into him, he snapped Klaus’ head around to look angrily at Vanya, that sick smile twisting back over his features. No, no, no… Vanya’s eyes began to glow slightly as a small breeze kicked up throughout the room. Making a split second panicked decision, Five leapt at his sister, blinking them both somewhere hopefully very far away and very empty. Klaus breathed out a sigh of relief. He was too busy shoving against the oppressing presence in his body to listen to his siblings. 

Blood pooling at his feet making Harold’s vision start greying at the edges, Klaus was shoved back into his body just as there was a  _ crack  _ against his temple. His surroundings went dark even before he felt his knees buckle beneath him.

  
  


“Oh, come  _ on! _ Really?” Klaus yelled into the cloudy grey sky above him. “What the  _ fuck! _ ”

“I’d thank you kindly to not swear so much.” the little grey girl’s voice interrupted him. Her voice was, as usual, stupidly neutral and painfully calm.

“Yeah, and I’d thank you kindly for one day without some bullshit, but I guess we can’t all have nice things.” He grumbled and flopped down onto the grass beside her picnic set up. There was no food laid out in front of her and the little grey wicker basket was empty as well. There was a little grey flower chain in her hands, half finished, but no flowers around her at all. The expanse in front of him showed a horizon of pine trees lining the sandy path. The textureless grass he was laying on was still without the presence of wind. Everything was so quiet. It was irritating.

“Don’t talk to me like that. I’m not the one who killed you.”

“Literally what is your job here? Do you just sit up here and watch shi-- stuff happen down there? Don’t you have control?”

“Not in the way you think. And it is not as though I just wait around on this plane for someone to arrive. This area is specifically for you. I have a job.”

“You have a  _ job? _ ” Klaus crowed, “You’re like fourteen.”

“I am ageless but okay.” She leaned over to flick him in the forehead. “I want you to leave now please.” Klaus ripped up a fistful of grass, rolling his eyes as the action made no noise and the patch where grass should be missing was still filled with lush grey grass. 

“I hate being here.” He groaned, throwing an arm over his eyes.

“Then stop coming here.” She shrugged, turning back to her flower chain. There were more flowers on there than there were when he first arrived, but he hadn’t seen her touch it in the time.

“Do you really think I have a say in when people kill me?”

“If you weren’t so annoying people wouldn’t want to kill you.”

“To be fair I think I was someone else for the past little bit, so they probably weren’t trying to kill me. No hard feelings of course.” He brought his arm back from his face looking at the open wound on his arm. It looked sterile and clean compared to how bloody it was just a minute ago when he was alive. “Can I ask you something”

“I can not guarantee I will answer, but I can not stop you from asking.” She mumbled, eyes focused on the flowers in front of her. A light grey snapdragon twirled between her fingers. He rolled his eyes again.

“Is it even  _ possible _ for me to get rid of the ghosts, or am I just stuck like this.” He rested his cheek against the grass to look up at her. Her long charcoal grey hair looked like it could do with some conditioner.

“I gave you this gift for a reason.” She started after a moment of silence. Her voice rang slightly like a bell. When he opened his mouth to interject, she cut a glare his way that made his mouth click shut forcefully. “I gave you this  _ gift _ and you squandered it for many years. In hindsight, I must admit that perhaps I did not have the… forethought to see how someone like you may be affected by such a gift and for this, I… apologize. However, this gift has many parts, and you have barely scratched its surface.”

He waited for her to continue, but she didn’t. “That wasn’t much of an answer actually.”

“I don’t care.’

“Fair enough.” He grunted as he rocked back up into a sitting position. “So how do I blow this popsicle stand, metaphorically speaking.”

She scoffed, rolling her eyes back at him. It was unexpected enough that it surprised a laugh out of him. Her tiny fingers plucked a daffodil from the previously empty basket behind her. 

“Take this.” She handed it to him. “And stop coming here. When it is your time you’ll know so stop trying my patience before that has even happened, please.”

As his fingers grasped the stem of the daffodil his vision flipped nauseatingly. He bolted upright with a gasp feeling like he was about to vomit, his eyes crusty as if he’d just woken up from a nap. The pain in his head was throbbing as he shut his eyes tightly against the bright light of the infirmary, hand coming up to grip his temple.

“What the fuck.” He groaned against the uproar of sound around him. It was never not disorienting coming from a textureless silent grey forest, but this was a little excessive. The bed he sitting on creaked with his weight, there was a piercing beep coming from behind him, the lights buzzed loudly overhead like a swarm of flies, and, loudest of all, his siblings were all speaking over each other at him. It took a moment to make sense of their voices so that they weren’t just one loud mass.

“Klaus? What is going on? Is Klaus awake? Is this Harold?” He finally picked out a voice from the group of sounds, singling in on Luther’s. He reached out the hand that wasn’t clutching at his head and cringed at the way moving pulled at the wounds on his forearm. Luther’s big hand grabbed his from beside the bed. “Klaus, how are you  _ alive? _ ”

“Shut up, shut uuuuup” Klaus groaned at how the sound grated on his steadily growing migraine. Slowly, the sounds simmered down and he cracked open one eye to scan the room. Luther was closest to him, both his big hands holding onto Klaus’ one. The rest of his siblings, including Five and Vanya, formed a semi circle around the bed he was currently laying on. In the corner of the room, Ben was standing looking ashen even for a ghost as he held the phantasmal shape of Harold back. The buzzing from the lights above him morphed until he recognized the sound of Grace humming to herself as she replaced his IV bag. The sound of her humming used to scare him when he was younger, it was the most robotic thing about her, but he’d since gotten used to the sound of overheating computer that came from her whenever she was focusing on a task.

“Welcome back, sweetheart!” The humming petered off as Grace looked at him, her reaction time still a split second delayed even after being fixed by Pogo. “Your heart was stopped for fifteen minutes. You caused your siblings quite the scare!”

He smiled at her from beneath his hand. “Thanks, Mom. You didn’t give me pain meds, right?”

“Just ibuprofen and tylenol. It isn’t advised to waste medical supplies on you when you’re dead, you know that.”

“M-mom?” Diego coughed into his fist, hiding his stutter but not the frightened waver in his voice, “What’s happening? You’re talking about this like he didn’t just die?

“Your sibling has never once stayed where he was told, darling.” Grace’s smile remained painted on her face, as she finished with the IV bag and turned instead to pick up an ice pack from the small infirmary freezer.

“You died.” Five’s voice was quiet as he stood still as a statue at the foot of the infirmary bed. His face was ashen. Ah, fuck. Guess it wasn’t the first time he’d seen Klaus’ dead body. “You were dead.”

“Oh, yeah, but I’m back and all in one piece!” Klaus hid his wince behind a grin and flexed one arm. “I’m back, Fivey, there’s no need to worry. The little girl upstairs and I have a little agreement I guess you could call it.”

“An agreement?” Ben grunted from the corner where he was still struggling with one unruly ghost in particular.

“Little girl upstairs-- Are you talking about  _ God?!? _ ” Diego sounded a bit winded. Klaus chuckled nervously, holding up his one free arm placatingly as Luther still held onto his other tightly.

“I mean… Yeah? I’ve been up there before. Not my first rodeo, I guess you could say. We don’t really like each other, so she just sends me back.” Vanya had one hand slapped over her mouth so tightly that her knuckles and the skin of her cheeks were turning white.

“What the fuck, Klaus?” Ben’s voice came again from the corner. He didn’t think ghosts could feel overexerted, but if they could Ben certainly sounded it. Hm.

“Hey, Benny, can you bring that bastard over here for a sec? I wanna try something.” 

“Ben’s here?  _ Wait,  _ are you asking him to bring you  _ Harold!?”  _ Allison demanded from her place standing beside Diego. “I actually think that should not happen? I think you should stay far away from this ghost in particular maybe?” Her voice was squeaky as though she was holding back tears.

“Nah, Nah, I wanna try something. The little girl said some shit that made me think. Untapped potential and all that-- very Reginald of her I must say.” He gestured widely for Ben to come over. His brother glowered at him but slowly maneuvered the hungry looking spirit toward Klaus, who shut his eyes and took a steadying breath. Very slightly underneath his eyelids, his irises began to glow pale blue. Underneath the layer of black painting his nails, his veins began to glow the same colour as his eyes. He slowly took his hand from Luther’s, reaching them forward to clasp either side of Harold’s head, fingertips resting coolly against his temples. Luther gasped beside him.

A dull throb echoed through his head and his arm, but he furrowed his brow and tried to think past it. A chill appeared at his fingertips, cool enough to burn. The sensation slowly filtered up through his veins, encompassing all of him. A small smile took over his face as Harold screamed and tried to jerk out of his grip.

“Oh no, you don’t!” Klaus kept his eyes closed, but tilted his head to the side. “I think I’d like you to fuck off actually.” Harold’s cries grew louder and louder crescendoing to decibels that made his brain feel like it was about to leak out of his eyes. Abruptly, the screaming cut off, echoing at the edges in the sound of a bell. Klaus kept his eyes closed, letting his arms flop back against the sheet as he took in the silence. It wasn’t a silence like the one with the little girl. This quiet was noisy with the beeping of medical equipment and the whirring buzz of his mom’s humming as she puttered around, preparing a salve for his wounds.

He laughed tiredly and fell asleep to the sound with the cold feeling of Ben’s hand resting on top of his. Lights danced behind his eyes from the overexertion, flitting about in the shape of bright yellow daffodils.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find my on tumblr @crykea or @watanuk-i


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